Movies have talent come and go all the time, but most of the movement happens way behind the scenes, often before a film is ever announced. Once the existence of a project is trumpeted to people outside of development, it’s pretty much set. A name might come or go, but there won’t be a huge amount of movement.

Not so with The Tourist, which since announcement has had a remarkable parade of stars and directors. I won’t run them all down again, because I’ve done it before (a couple of times), but things have changed once more. Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, director of the Oscar-winning The Lives of Others, is once again directing after having walked away back in November. Read More »

I wrote recently about the movie The Tourist that some projects just don’t seem to die, no matter how the talent involved comes and goes. Maybe they should, though. Especially if they end up being Angelina Jolie films. We’ve just seen the US trailer for Salt, and the more I look at that, the more it looks ridiculous. (And I’m told it’s a disaster; we’ll see about that.) Now The Tourist, to which she just provisionally signed, is undergoing yet another talent swap — lead actor Sam Worthington is out, as is presumed directorFlorian von Donnersmarck. Who’s in — one is a very big name — after the break. Read More »

In this week’s /Filmcast, Dave Chen, Devindra Hardawar and Adam Quigley praise The Inside Man, wonder why America can’t handle miniseries, celebrate the joys of Glee, and explain the similarities between Where the Wild Things Are and Children of Men. Special guest Stephen Tobolowsky joins us for this episode. You can currently see Stephen on Glee, which airs on FOX, Wednesdays at 9 PM EST.

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This is a pretty great development, at least for the cast and crew of The Tourist. The film has gone through a lot of personnel tweaks, as we’ve reported over the last few weeks. The cast finally settled down, with Angelina Jolie and Sam Worthington set as the two leads. With those in place, it seems like the director’s chair formerly held by Bharat Nalluri will be filled by a great talent: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, who won the 2007 Best Foreign Language Film Oscar for his film The Lives of Others. Read More »

While some films can’t get off the ground no matter what big, impressive names get attached, others just can’t die. The Tourist seems to be one of the latter. Once a possible starring vehicle for Tom Cruise, the picture carried on when he bailed; Sam Worthingtonstepped in to fill his shoes. Now co-star Charlize Theron has skipped out as well, along with director Bharat Nalluri. Set to take Theron’s place is Angelina Jolie. Read More »

The fallout from Tom Cruise’s decision to star in James Mangold’s Witchita continues. Among the projects Cruise had been circling for a while was The Tourist, a remake of the 2005 French film Anthony Zimmer that will be directed by Bharat Nalluri. Charlize Theron has been in the cast since last year; now according to VarietySam Worthington will join her as an American tourist who is set up to draw out a Keyser Soze-like criminal mastermind. Read More »

Update: Tom Cruise was being courted for at least six different big Hollywood projects. Out of all the possible projects, the star has chosen the least interesting one. Cruise is in talks to join Cameron Diaz in the 20th Century Fox action-comedy Wichita. Cruise will play an undercover agent who pops in and out of the life of a woman (Diaz) who has man trouble. Cruise and Diaz have approved the script, which most recently was worked on by Scott Frank (The Lookout) and Laeta Kalogridis (Shutter Island). Directed by Walk the Line/3:10 to Yuma helmer James Mangold, Fox hopes to have the film in theaters for a Summer 2010 release.Read More »

Variety have published a very exciting list of every film that could, potentially, become the next film for Tom Cruise – as well as a list of the various writers and directors working on them. The focus is on the writers, as the umbrella notion here is that Cruise is calling for lotsa costly rewrites from script doctors. Curiously enough, it is later made clear in the piece that some of these writers aren’t doctoring as much as coming on to the projects as full-on writers.

The full list follows, but sadly it doesn’t contain two interesting prospects: Susanne Bier‘s Lost For Words and Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck‘s The 28th Amendment. Hopefully they’ll still go ahead with a different lead, or be resurrected once Cruise has cleared his plate a little.